Who's Who

“ The groups and single figures, on their own basis, abstracted from the general composition, and considered without attention to the plan, frequently exhibit those genuine and unaffected attitudes, those simple graces, which nature and the heart alone can dictate, and only an eye inspired by both discover. ”

“ He was “the parson,” in canonical phrase—that is to say, The Person, the somebody of consequence among his own people. These men were not, however, smoothed down into a monotonous aspect of life and manners by this remote and secluded existence. They imbibed, each in his own peculiar circle, the hue of surrounding objects, and were tinged into distinctive colouring and character by many a contrast of scenery and people. ”

“ Now an object, such as Socrates, or this world, or as yourself, is called an individual, as we before said, when one conceives that for a particular and determinate purpose no other object could be substituted for this one. ”

“ When I divide the dis course into heads, or mention any particulars which I wish to impress upon the attention, or endeavour to clear up a difficulty, or enforce a truth by some familiar local illustration, I ascertain for myself, by questioning each class of people in succession, whether they understand, and are likely to carry home, the lessons they have been taught. ”

“ They have, in pursuance of their Theory, mapped out the human scull into compartments, to each of which they have assigned a particular faculty or sentiment, and they profess to tell, with some degree of accuracy, the individual character by the peculiar formation of the head. ”

“ The way certain classes arrogate to themselves the title of the people has never pleased me. Why are some human beings the people, the people only, and others not? I’m of the people myself, I’ve worked all my days like a knife-grinder and I’ve really never changed. ”

“ Who they are, whence they come or whither they go, their names even, except such as they choose to adopt or which may be given them, are all questions which none but themselves can answer. As their usefulness to the service depends not upon the unravelling of either of these mysteries but little thought is bestowed upon them. ”

“ Ask which is a tree or a stone, — a horse or a man, — you get the same answer from every one. But when you ask not simply which are horses, but also which horses are fit to run well in a race — when you ask not merely about which are men, but which men are healthy or unhealthy — are the multitude all of one mind, or all competent to answer? ”

“ It appeared to me that any person, unbiassed by theories on such a subject, looking at that crowd, would have come to the conclusion, sadly or gladly, according to his nature, that we are, in fact, "somebody else." ”

“ Afterwards individualities and particular existences, from the most humble to those of the King and of the Priest, the highest expressions of our society, will group themselves according to their rank. ”

“ And that in a world of such truth that every man’s name and title there shall be a strict and true and entirely accurate and adequate description and exposition of the very thoughts and intents and imaginations of his heart? How shall I, how shall you, my brethren, ever have ‘Think-well’ written on our forehead?—Well, with God all things are possible. ”

“ For how do we know people about us for distinct individualities? We know them psychically by the fact that each seems conscious of himself and of his own emotions, thoughts, and memories, as being his own, and as not being anybody else's. ”

“ When I go into the different precincts and hear all the tales that they have got afloat about me, and the character that they give me, it is somebody that I don't know anything about—somebody that I never heard of before. ”

“ On the contrary, the higher, over-individual ends, as they are sometimes called, — politics, industry, science, literature, art — imply a differentiation among men that in spite of its significance would defy classification. ”

“ In reference to the first of these considerations, I venture to remind you that in my list of supporters are to be found many names which are great names—names of the highest celebrity in literature and science, and whose authority, in any matter which they attest, no unprejudiced human being would ever dream of calling in question. On this point I fearlessly court comparison with the lists of any of my esteemed rivals for your favour. ”

“ I am asking you to look up, not back, nor away among the long dead years for any cause or ideal. I am asking you to search for your leader among your contemporaries, not satisfied until you find him, not limited in your devotion when you have found him, taking his cause to be yours. ”

“ It is, however, necessary that the sphere in which the personages of our story are about to act should be in some measure indicated, in order to facilitate the comprehension of their respective movements. ”

“ That is the manner of these book-folk. They ask always for names. If they can but label a thing in a word or in a volume of description they are satisfied that they have achieved knowledge. They bandy these names of theirs as a talisman. ”

“ Thus, on the one hand, the old group of worshippers are being gradually transformed into a group personage with a general character conformable to the particular play, while, on the other hand, the individual actor is introducing dramatic personality distinct from groups or abstract personages. ”

“ Many of those names stand for some most powerful individuality, yet all we have is a formula, a lineage, with symbols and names in the place of living beings, and even that established only by careful work, picking out and sifting relationships from various lives. ”

“ And so, instead of men and women, we find ourselves in a world inhabited by incarnated leaders, or paragraphs, or items of this or that journal. We are apt to wonder at the scholarship of the men of two centuries ago. ”

“ In all these instances, where there are no circumstances that constitute a character, and familiarize to us the person spoken of, we naturally enquire who he is, and for want of farther information become indifferent as to what is recorded of him. ”

“ I had already grasped the fact that the title of my discourse was the important thing. In the list of the Society's lectures sent to me there was hardly one whose title did not impress the imagination in advance. I must be equally impressive... ”

“ There are for instance more kinds of people, I think, in the world—more irreducible kinds—than your categories meet. However, your categories do you, none the less, great honour, the greatest, worked out as they are; and I quite agree that, as before hinted, if one wants more life, there is Mr. ”

“ Taking less eras of history than some of the great men who had illustrated them, he thought how such characters would be sure to interest one whose views of life were eminently practical, and so a great law-giver, a legislator, a great general, or orator, was each evening selected for their reading. ”

“ And many there are who go to and fro in obscurity, mere names on class lists or voices on the cheering benches. Yet who would venture to assert that among these insignificants some distinguished man of the future may not be hidden? ”

“ His fertile brain had evolved character after character, all clear-drawn and distinct, startlingly natural in many instances—even the most venomous of his critics acknowledged that—until the sum of them was immense. ”

“ In having the meaning of the name “man” called up by association, that is, in having the ideas, I recognise that “man” is a name of James, and John, and Homer, and Socrates, and all the individuals of the class. 390 This is pure association. In having the meaning of the name “animal” called up by association, I recognise that it is a name of James, and John, and all the individuals of the same class, as well as of all the individuals of other classes; and this is all that is meant by my Belief in the truth of the proposition. Man is the name of one cluster of ideas ”

“ Lord, in which the objects, or agents, of one class are, without any formal notice, employed in the place of the persons or things of which the passages in which they occur treat; and they are exhibited either as exerting, or as subjected to an agency proper to their nature, in order to represent by analogy, the agency which those persons are to exert, or of which those things are to be the subjects. ”

“ The paternal voice says: ‘You must not be particular; you are about to have a profession to live by; follow those who have thriven the best in it.’ Now, among these, whatever be the profession, canst thou point out to me one single philosopher? ”

“ And in this, as in every movement, there are leaders,—those who have understood the meaning of life more clearly than others,—and of these advanced men there is always one who has, in his words and by his life, expressed this meaning more clearly, accessibly, and strongly than others. ”

“ In this way one person, of complex character, gets replaced by several, each of whom possesses a different aspect of the character that in a simpler form of the myth was combined in one being; usually the different individuals closely resemble one another in other respects, for instance in age. ”

“ The first point however which demands our attention is to determine in which of the higher classes soul is included and what is its generic character — whether, in other words, it is an individual thing and real substance or a quality or quantity or any other of the categories as they have been distinguished. ”

“ Busy men, moreover, are given to detail, and detail fills the eye and ear; men of reflection deal more with principles, and these lie beyond the range of ordinary vision.
The proposition which I here put forward, based on many years of observation and study, is fundamental, and affects, more or less, a wide range of character in every individual. ”

“ An abstract term like 'scarlet,' which is the name of one definite attribute, may be reckoned 'individual,' while a term like 'human nature,' which is the name of a whole group of attributes, would more fitly be regarded as collective. ”

“ Each student should bring to the class a statement of what he regards as the chief thought in each paper as it comes up,—not the moral of the paper, but the chief end which the writer seems to have in view, the thought which most strongly strikes the reader. ”

“ Who assigns such Reasons for all Events, as seem, even at this distance, neither too great, nor too little: Who, in Military Matters, takes Care, not only to shew his own Skill, but to make his Reader a Judge, as well as himself: Who, in Civil Affairs, makes his Judgment of the Conduct of every People from the several Constitutions of their respective Governments, or from the Characters and Circumstances of the Actors themselves: And last of all, Who scrupulously avoids saying any Thing that might appear incredible to Posterity ”

“ Their generic attributes are known, but their individual histories and characters are not the subject of myths. For they exist in classes rather than as individuals, and the members of each class are indistinguishable. ”

“ The Latin persona originally meant an actor's mask; [50] then the part you play in a drama, as we say "dramatis personæ"; then the part you play in life, the responsible individual who eats, drinks, studies, marries and dies. When there is a collective individuality we talk about a "persona moralis," as in the case of a corporation. ”

“ We may therefore define character as an expression of the organization of the wishes resulting from temperament and experience, understanding by “organization” the general pattern which the wishes as a whole tend to assume among themselves. ”

“ Such, then, is the history of the genesis of this story, and the reader is requested to bear its purpose in mind as he skims it. Two types in two groups are opposed to each other; each group represents a set of ideas, social and moral, the one coming on, conquering, overwhelming, the other disappearing and likely soon to be looked back upon as having become extinct in the moral world like asceticism and mysticism. ”

“ SOCRATES: My answer is, that all things instrumental, remedial, material, are given to us with a view to generation, and that each generation is relative to, or for the sake of, some being or essence, and that the whole of generation is relative to the whole of essence.
PROTARCHUS: Assuredly.
SOCRATES: Then pleasure, being a generation, must surely be for the sake of some essence? ”

“ Hitherto I have spoken altogether on conversation with those whose rank and position of life corresponds with your own. A few words now on conversation, first, with those of a higher rank, and, secondly, with those in the humbler conditions of life—to use the common phrase; and every man should be qualified and prepared for any and for all kinds of association. ”

“ In my theory, Sir, there is no selection—nothing like that undercurrent of partiality which runs through the Bible; all are treated alike, standing on the same level; and hence my expression, he sympathizes with individual man, means every man. ”

“ The class called People (to which you and I, with no little pride, attach ourselves) has certain casual, yet profound, assumptions, which are called "commonplaces," as that children are charming, or that twilight is sad and sentimental, or that one man fighting three is a fine sight. ”

“ Literature, therefore, apparently begins in some countries with the prominence of the individual. But we must remember that this early individualism is something very different from that to which our modern associations are accustomed. The chief of clan or tribe represents his group. Such personifications of the group we are liable to confuse with individual character in the modern sense. ”